1. Field of Art
The present invention generally relates to the field of computer software, and more specifically, to methods of displaying videos within software applications.
2. Description of the Related Art
A number of web sites on the Internet are now available that allow users to post and share digital video content in various ways. However, such existing video sharing web sites fail to provide an effective user interface that enables a user to view and interact with the video content in a convenient manner. For example, some video sharing sites display a video at only a single resolution (e.g., 320×240), and do not to resize the video when the user increases or decreases the size of the browser window, leading to the video not taking advantage of the larger screen size when the window is expanded, or being “cropped” when the window is contracted. Still other systems allow the video to be scrolled along with other content displayed in the window, leading to portions of the video disappearing from view as the user scrolls in the window. Further, other sites do not ensure that the video playback controls, such as play/pause, skip forward, skip back, and progress indicator controls, associated with the video are always visible to the user, thus requiring users to take additional actions, such as scrolling the window, before they can control video playback.